


for i am a weary traveller

by besidemethewholedamntime



Series: at the end of the day all i need is you [6]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Modern Royalty AU, Stars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-03
Updated: 2021-02-03
Packaged: 2021-03-15 08:20:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29186193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/besidemethewholedamntime/pseuds/besidemethewholedamntime
Summary: "It’s always like that but it’s never like this. There are never the stars illuminating them the way they are now.There is never this look in his eyes, like he is so completely drunk on the idea of love, of loving her, and of being so completely loved in return. She knows, of course, and he does, too, but she feels it quite suddenly in a way she never has before."They exchange gifts and promises under the stars. Part 6 of my modern royalty au although you don't technically have to have read others first.
Relationships: Leo Fitz/Jemma Simmons
Series: at the end of the day all i need is you [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1934755
Comments: 26
Kudos: 75





	for i am a weary traveller

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bluengbhd](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluengbhd/gifts).



> HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MARTINA! I am beyond excited to share this with you and it has been so hard to keep it a secret from you but I hope you can appreciate why I did. You're one of my favourite beans on the planet and you're so lovely and kind and funny and thoughtful and the list is truly endless! Thank you so much for being you and I hope you have the most wonderful day that you deserve <3
> 
> This is part of my modern royalty AU and though it would probably make sense to you to read at least one other part first, you don't really have to!
> 
> There's not too much to say about this because I don't want to spoil what's coming but I hope you enjoy it and I hope it makes up for everything I've done to them in this universe before :o 
> 
> Title and poem from Kamand Kojouri. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy <3

_If you are a part of me,_   
_then you’re the best part._   
_And if you're separate from me,_   
_then you are my destination._   
_But I’ve become a weary traveller,_   
_so please,_   
_let us never be apart._

She’s early to meet him.

She’s even earlier than early, really. He always tells her a time at least fifteen minutes later than he wants her to be there – many a surprise has been ruined because of her penchant for being early. She knows that this is what he’s done today. _Half ten, Jemma,_ he’d said firmly on the phone, but she knew fine well that he’d be expecting her from quarter past. Usually, she respects the fifteen-minute rule, and it works well for them, but today it’s like there are bees buzzing in her veins, and so impatient is she to see him that she ends up leaving earlier than she means to and she’s walking down the path to the woods, to their special place, when the hour hand on her watch has just ticked past ten.

She’s not paying attention at first, which is entirely unlike her. Her hat is pulled low on her head and the torch she’s snatched is on its way out so instead of a bright white light, it just gives off a pale grey glow, almost entirely useless for ensuring she doesn’t break her ankle on fallen trees or get smacked in the face with an errant branch. Muttering to herself, she keeps her head down, carefully picking her way across the ground that really she does know _so well_ but that she just cannot _see_ with this bloody useless torch and just when she was so _excited_ to see Fitz and tell him-

_Oh._

It’s her first thought, because her torch has finally sputtered and died and because she barely notices it as it does. She’s reached their special spot without knowing it, and instead of the darkness she was expecting to wait in, there are instead hundreds of twinkly lights hung from the trees, un-expertly wrapped around trunks and lower-hanging branches. They sway gently in the breeze that reaches them, even in this far into the trees, and upon closer inspection she realises that they’re shaped like stars.

“I knew you’d be early.”

Fitz appears from her left, his eyebrow raised but there’s a grin on his face that causes her heart to grin, too, even though all her face can do is stare in amazement at the stars he has brought down for her.

“Fitz…” she breathes, “What’s all this?”

He comes closer, nudging her shoulder with his. His voice is adorably hopeful. “You like it?”

“Like it? Fitz, I love it. I have no idea how you managed to do all of… this.” She gestures at the stars. Every inch of this clearing is covered with them. Their little stick den in the corner, still somehow standing after all of these years. The fallen log across the middle. Even the picnic basket, which she spies lying upon the log next to their familiar blanket, has stars around its handle.

She turns to him, his face handsome in the half-light. “Why?”

He shrugs. “Happy New Year, Jemma.”

There is a small, expertly-made bonfire crackling safely away, but the warmth of it is nothing compared to the warmth of his love radiating from him in waves. Her voice is stuck in her throat, and the only thing she manages to get past all of the other words she wants to say is, “It’s not the new year yet.”

He laughs, low and breathy, like he expected her response. “Close enough.”

They spend the last vestiges of every year together like this, in the little clearing that’s been theirs since they were five years old. They bring hot drinks and a picnic and lie together on the picnic blanket waiting to hear the bells ring. There are parties they should both probably be at, other people they should probably be with, but they never go, and their families have long given up on saying anything. In these last few hours it’s always just the two of them in their own little world, protected from everyone and everything around them.

It’s always like that but it’s never like _this._ There are never the stars illuminating them the way they are now. There is never this look in his eyes, like he is so completely drunk on the idea of love, of loving her, and of being so completely loved in return. She knows, of course, and he does, too, but she _feels_ it quite suddenly in a way she never has before.

She’s so completely stunned by this feeling that she forgets the reason why she’s here as early as she is, why she’d been unable to even pretend to stick to their rule, and in looking at him the feeling makes itself known again. Her blood rushes, hot even in this cold December night, and she has a sudden urge to pepper kisses all over Fitz’s face, which she only just manages to ignore. This has to come first.

“I have to tell you something.”

“Yeah,” he says, unperturbed, voice hoarse. “I need to tell you something, too.”

“No, Fitz, I have to tell you this first.”

He looks at her curiously then. “Alright,” he says slowly. “On you go.”

She’s been so excited to tell him all day, so excited that she’s sure she’s worn tracks on her bedroom carpet in an effort to pace out her impatience, her frustration at the clock hand for not moving faster just because she wanted it to. Now that the moment is here, however, and caught off-guard by the magic he has made, everything she has practised for hours (though really months, really years) falls out of her head and the only thing she can think to do is drop her torch at their feet, grasp his gloved hands in hers, and say,

“Marry me.”

Fitz’s face is picture-perfect confusion. “ _What?!”_

She laughs, breathy, and grasps tighter. “Will you marry me, Fitz?”

He’s looking at her like she’s insane, like all of her marbles have been lost on her journey here and maybe they have, because at his confusion she can only laugh again, only hold his hands in hers like she’d hold on to them forever.

“I mean it,” she says. “I really mean it. I’ve got the signed permission from my parents with the royal seal on it and everything. It’ll have to be a different story, of course, something proper and professional but I didn’t think you’d mind.”

“No,” he says, voice a hoarse whisper. “No, I don’t mind.” Then he looks down at their joined hands, back up at her through his lashes with a quizzical look on his face. “How?”

“After everything that’s happened to us this year I wasn’t going to leave it another, and I made them see that.” She chuckles a little. “The look on my mother’s face when – oh, well it doesn’t matter now. The only thing that matters is that I did it, Fitz. I really did it.” She presses her forehead to his, looking down at their hands between them, and whispers, “So what do you say?”

The world stops turning for the longest moment it takes Fitz to inhale and then exhale again. “What do I say? I say…” he draws the word out and disengages one of his hands, digging it into his pocket and bringing it out again without taking his eyes from hers, “that it’s lucky I brought this with me.” And he unfurls his hand between them, revealing the little ring box he has offered to her six times before.

Of course he’s brought it with him. _Of course_ he has.

She bites her lip to stop herself from smiling so wide her face would split in two. “Oh, Fitz,” she whispers. “How did you know?”

“I didn’t,” he tells her. “I just had to try it again before the year ended. But you beat me to it.”

They are so perfectly synchronised to each other, even more than they know. She’s sure that if they checked, their hearts would beat at the same time, too.

“Well,” she says, tugging off her gloves, “go on then.”

It’s a challenge but he just shakes his head and for a moment she can’t believe that the one time he can, the one time permission is granted, he’s refusing her. “No,” he says, “this one’s yours.”

“Alright then.” She straightens up, shakes herself out slightly, looks into the face of her heart. “Leopold Fitz,” she begins, “will you marry me?”

There is a bonfire and there are star-lights all around them but the smile on his face is easily the brightest thing here. Making him happy is her most favourite thing in all the world. She could never love another the way she does him, and now it’s certain she doesn’t have to even try.

“Jemma Simmons,” he says, ever so reverently, and she’s caught off guard momentarily by the use of her name. Nobody ever calls her that. Those syllables never fall from anybody else’s lips, only his. She thinks it might belong to him more than her now. “Absolutely, I will marry you.”

And no sooner has he said the words and he’s already slipping the ring onto her finger. It sits there coolly and comfortably, as though it always has. A perfect fit, even though she has never once worn it before. It seems that the universe, perhaps, is giving them a chance.

“Look at that,” Fitz says, his thumb brushing gentle arcs across the back of her hand. She wants to know how his own are so warm, how they always seem to be so warm. _Home_ she thinks when they touch her. _This is home._

“Yes,” she says, but she’s not looking at the ring like he is. Instead, she’s looking at him. “Look at that.”

His eyes flick up to hers and his slow smile has her feeling dizzy. The moment his lips touch hers it’s as though fireworks go off inside her chest. Her edges are no longer clear, there’s no telling where she ends and he begins. Some last little part of her that was tucking itself away for no good reason other than fear has unfurled and has been given to him. There is no part of her left that he does not know.

She thought it would be different. She thought engagement was just a formality and that nothing would change between them because they already knew they’d go to the ends of the earth for each other. That was naïve of her. Everything has changed. The future, which before was just a void filled with the monotonous drone of duty, now has colour, now has life, and she knows she can face whatever is coming her way now that she’ll have him by her side.

There will be real fireworks less than two hours from now. The country will be celebrating the new year and at the party inside her father will cross his arms and valiantly try to start _Auld Lang Syne._ There will be kisses and laughter and cheers and the clinking of so many glasses at once that she’ll be surprised there isn’t some kind of shockwave resulting from it.

The entire country will have that moment, but here and now they have their own and whilst it’s nothing like she ever imagined, she knows this is the only way it could be. Just the two of them in the place they first met, with the stars he has brought down from the heavens for her shining infinitely all around.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Birthday, Martina!!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading - I hope you enjoyed this! Please feel free to leave kudos/comments. Please feel free not to. Either way, I hope you have a lovely day and you're all managing to stay safe and well in this crazy world <3


End file.
